Our present invention relates to a garment fastener, especially for swim wear and lingerie, and which, in particular, can be fabricated from a polycarbonate synthetic resin or other transparent synthetic resin material.
The provision of garment fasteners for securing two parts of a garment together in a releasable manner, e.g. a strap and a body of a garment or two strap segments of a garment has a number of important requirements especially when the garment is a swimsuit or an item of lingerie, such as a brassiere. Usually the garment fastener must be relatively small so as not to contribute an unaesthetic feature to the garment. Nevertheless it must be easily manipulated, of sufficient strength to withstand tensile stresses to which it may be subjected, and it must be securely held by the garment part to which it is affixed. While garment fasteners with loops through which straps or strap-like strips of the garment can be passed, have been provided in the past, a variety of problems are associated with them. Firstly, it cannot always be guaranteed that the strap or fabric strip passing through an elongated loop will remain distributed uniformly over the length of the slot. Furthermore, the attachment of the fastener part to the fabric is often unreliable. The problem is most pronounced where the fasteners must be openable and closeable and must be relatively small.
It is therefore the principal object of the present invention to provide a garment fastener for swimsuits, brassieres and lingerie whereby the drawbacks of the earlier systems are avoided.
Another object of this invention is to provide a garment fastener for the purposes described which affords a more reliable attachment of the fastener part to the garment part in a garment fastener of the type in which an elongated loop receives a strap or strip of the fastener.
These objects and others which will become more readily apparent hereinafter are attained, in accordance with the invention in a garment fastener of the type having an elongated loop defining a slot through which a strap or strip of the fabric is to be passed and in which the bar at the outside of that loop has formed unitarily therewith an attachment flange which is secured to the fabric by stitching and/or welding. This generally flat, thin attachment flange can be pierced through by the stitching needle by which the strap or fabric strap is secured and the stitching has the advantage that, if the stitching is removed, the strap or strip can be drawn through the slot to adjust the relative position of the fabric and the attachment flange and thereby allow restricting to expand the garment or allow it to be contracted.
Advantageously, that bar can have on its inner side, of convex formation, i.e. a curved bump, assisting in distributing the fabric in the slot uniformly.
The flange may be secured to the fabric also by welding or exclusively by welding as may be desired.
The garment fastener according to the invention can comprise:
a fastener body adapted to be affixed to first part of a garment;
a loop formed on the body and provided with an elongated slot through which a portion of a second part of the garment can be passed; and
an attachment flange coplanar with the loop and of a thickness smaller than that of the body and the loop projecting from the loop away from the body and overlain by a portion of the second part of the garment adjacent the portion passed through the loop, the attachment flange being secured to the second part of the garment along the portion of the second part overlying the attachment flange.
According to a feature of the invention, the attachment flange can taper in thickness away from the loop or bar and can be provided on at least one side and preferably both sides with arrays of mutually orthogonal ribs or can be constituted by the mutually orthogonal ribs.
The two halves of the garment fastener, which can releasably interengage, can be identical to one another.